Some Exercises in Form

A Coming of Age

It was as if the moon had come down upon this kindred
Not one but many, they were the pure light of vigil
A wake where no one must sleep lest the devil pilfer
His wandering soul, his vulnerable body, a seedling
Hidden in the heart of this old, old man, puerile in his
Desires because he often asked for water, often asked
To be patted, to be naked like a baby, to babble this
And that until everyone had fallen asleep, tired, tasked
To the care of his body and now his soul, the children
Do not cry, they have no arduous duties but to harken.

In the night, the wailing of the dying comes like the
Swelling of copulating genitals and the reality registers
In the posterior when the children come of age, and the
Memory of death is inextricably linked to the pleasures
Of coition, making the making of babies so much like
The gruelling care for ones parents in their senile years
Don’t we all lose our breaths to the kisses, to the height
Of our lover’s hunger for soft cheeks and bosoms, tears
In our jewels with each day of want, we palpitate as if
We were to breathe our last holding the seed in our lips.